Spain: A Comeback for Wood and Pellet Heating

World events are shaping remote, rural villages

I recently took a trip to Spain with my wife to walk the Camino Primitivo, a Christian pilgrim route connecting small towns in the far northwest corner of the country. I wasn’t looking for wood or pellet stoves—but there were so many that I couldn’t help but start paying attention, given my day job. In one town, Tineo, nearly every store and restaurant had a pellet stove, and they all looked brand new.

As I started talking to people and doing a bit of reading, an interesting story emerged. The invasion of Ukraine sent shockwaves through European energy markets that are still reverberating today. Then came the bombing of Iran and closure of the Straits of Hormuz. The result: Spain is now offering more incentives for homes and businesses to switch to pellet stoves and boilers.

Along the Camino, pellet stoves showed up everywhere, each in its own context. In one hotel lobby, a stove had a large handwritten note: “Do not touch.” In a general store, one was surrounded by a small safety fence. In an upscale eatery, the pellet stove was part of a carefully curated retro aesthetic. They clearly add a sense of coziness—but like everywhere else, the real driver is economics.

We saw several Italian models, but the most common seemed to be made in Galicia in Northwest Spain by Ecoforest. One popular model, the Bolonia, is strikingly slim—designed to fit even in a hallway. Ecoforest also makes heat pumps, and with smart thermostat software, the two types of heaters can switch back and forth depending on outdoor temperatures and heating needs.

In Spain, incentives are often targeted at towns with fewer than 5,000 residents, part of a broader effort to combat rural depopulation and support areas without access to natural gas networks. These programs align with European Union funding frameworks aimed at sparsely populated and economically disadvantaged regions, with some funding coming directly from the EU.

Incentives are handled regionally, not nationally, and usually involve documentation from both a qualified installer and a local permit.  When an existing stove is simply swapped out for a new one, there is less paperwork to access incentives, but DIY installs are rare whether incentives are involved or not. Professional installation is required and stoves must be registered with the local authority.  The trail we walked went through two regions - Galicia and Asturias - and both have generous subsidies but Galicia's  are even more generous leading to a greater use of pellet heating.  In some provinces, subsidies are more if you are reducing reliance on coal or oil, and less for electricity. In others, household income may have more of an impact, and residing in a rural area or small town almost always increases the amount. Both equipment cost and installation are covered with total costs usually coming to 3,000 - 5,000 Euros ($3,500 0 $5,800 US). and the incentive usually between 30 - 50%.

Cordwood heating

Cordwood heating is still more common than pellet heating, though it receives few if any incentives. A few things stood out to me. Firewood lengths were often surprisingly short—frequently just 8–10 inches, and rarely more than 14–16 inches. Wood was almost always stored under a roof, and much of it looked like it had been seasoning for several years.

That suggested a mature, long-standing wood heating culture where the importance of properly dried wood is well understood. Interestingly, the shorter log lengths didn’t seem tied to stove size. Many older rural stoves are sized more like U.S. stoves and bear little resemblance to the more modern, sleek, vertically oriented European models.

One rural restaurant along the trail—also offering a few guest rooms—used a wood-fired cookstove that piped hot water upstairs. While I was there, the good-natured cook was cursing the stove, which had just started leaking. It was a reminder that these hot water systems can lead, and also they ca be fixed by the owner. 

Spain, like the rest of Europe, has at least a 3,000-year head start on wood heating and forest harvesting. We saw countless stone homes that looked 500 years old, many with equally old chimneys still in use. That long history is also visible in the landscape: massive trees continue to be coppiced, a practice where branches are cut regularly for fuel and allowed to regrow—a system still actively used today.

Heavy deforestation began during Roman times about 2,000 years ago and peaked between 1850 and 1920, much like in the United States. But the legacy of that history feels more visible in Spain. Unlike the U.S., where large natural forests remain, many of the forests we saw appeared to be plantations, and not always managed sustainably.

As in the U.S., most wood demand is driven by construction, not firewood. Firewood use is relatively small by comparison.

National heating trends

Reliable data on how many Spanish homes use wood or pellet heating is hard to pin down, but most estimates suggest that 15–20% of homes use wood or pellets as a primary or secondary heating source. Up to 5% may rely on it as their primary fuel.

Spain is less densely populated than countries like France, Germany, or Italy, but it is also warmer, and wood and pellet heating are less established. Unlike Austria, France, Germany, and Italy, Spain has not historically provided strong incentives for pellet stoves and boilers—though that is now changing.

Global energy disruptions are shifting the equation. Locally sourced, renewable energy is becoming more attractive compared to fossil fuels that must travel long distances. This provides not only more stable prices, but a healthy diversity of local sources of electricity.

Spain’s population is about 49 million—roughly 10 million more than California—and rural depopulation is a significant issue. Energy policy is increasingly being used as a tool to support small-town economies.

Most of Spain has relatively mild winters, and about 30% of homes lack central heating. As in Italy, this makes pellet stoves a practical option for  heating the core of the house rather than whole-home systems. In the colder, mountainous northern regions—which are also more forested—winters are harsher, and in some areas up to a third of homes still use wood or pellets.

Spain produces, exports and imports wood pellets which are almost entirely used for small and large heating systems. Many pellet plants are co-located with sawmills or carpentry shops. In some regions, biomass boilers also burn olive pits, nut shells, and, to a lesser extent, sunflower husks. Most pellet production happens in rural areas, so incentives for pellet heating also function as support for local businesses.

Electric rates and pellet heating

One newer incentive for pellet stoves comes from electricity pricing. Under Spain’s tariff structure, electricity is most expensive during peak hours—typically 10am–2pm and 6pm–10pm on weekdays. Heat pumps are very popular, so this creates an opportunity: households can rely more on pellet stoves during those expensive hours and when temperatures drop below freezing.

At the same time, broader trends are shifting. Since 2022, electricity prices in Spain and much of Europe have stabilized or declined, while pellet prices have risen.

Where we were hiking, in the mountainous northwest, wind turbines were everywhere. The expansion of wind energy there—and solar in the south—has helped bring electricity prices down. As a result, Spain now has some of the lowest electricity rates in Europe.

 

Conclusion

If you enjoy hiking, I highly recommend the Camino Primitivo—or any of the caminos in Spain. You pass

through stunning countryside and small towns, stay in affordable local inns, and can even have your luggage transported each day between accommodations.

Along the way, you don’t just see beautiful landscapes—you also witness thousands of years of human history, including the evolution of how people heat their homes. And that history is still unfolding, as Spain begins to embrace a new generation of pellet heating.

Further reading

 

Spanish Energy Efficiency Grants in 2025

How Spaniards Can Get a Subsidy to Replace an Old Boiler

Subsidies to fund the energy transition

USDA Spanish Wood Pellet Market Outlook 2023

Rules for Wood Burners in Spain

Spain Sees Increase in Pellet Fuel Market

Ecoforest celebrates 30 years of innovation in sustainable HVAC equipment

 

The US needs an eco label for wood and pellet heaters

Europe’s extensive experience with stove eco-labels shows clear benefits

While Europe is far behind the US when it comes to national stove emission standards, European wood stove and wood smoke regulation is far ahead of the US in some ways.  Much of the credit is due to Europe’s history of using eco labels.  National regulations in the US, such as the 1988 and 2015 EPA regulations, only provide a floor below which stoves cannot go.  And efforts to keep that floor as low as possible to allow the sales of low-performing technology allows the entire industry to play by same low standards.

Jan. 2020 update: Germany's Blue Angel eco-label announces a innovative new standard primarily for stoves that have automated air supply and electrostatic precipitators.

Eco labels provide incentives to make stoves cleaner and more efficient.  In turn, those higher standards can influence the entire market. Eco-labels also provide a ready-made structure for change out and incentive programs to move the market toward cleaner and more efficient devices.  In the US, virtually all new stoves qualify for the federal tax credit and change out programs, abdicating one of the best opportunities to improve the stock of stoves in the country.   

Europe is battling the same problem as the US with wood stoves that perform far worse in the field than they did in the lab.  A recent German report concluded that “there aren’t enough incentives to develop more sophisticated technical solutions to reduce emissions in the real-world.”  One of the only solutions is to include sensors and microprocessors so that stoves can optimize combustion on their own. European stove producers have undertaken R&D with automated functions far more than US producers, leading to promising designs.  An eco-label could recognize these advances and help these stoves gain a foothold in the market.  

Without an effective eco-label, R&D support, and meaningful incentives, stove technology could easily languish again, as it did after the minimum 1990 NSPS and 1995 Washington State regulations were met.  While pellet stoves were far cleaner, their efficiencies were often very poor, because there was no motivation to produce cleaner or higher efficiency units.  

The increase of stove sales and usage since 2000 has resulted in greater air pollution in both Europe and the US, leading to outright bans in some areas and a much harder road for stoves to be accepted as a top tier renewable energy technology.  Without a way for consumers and policy makers to easily distinguish between the best available technology and mediocre technology that just meets the minimum national emission standards, the fate of even the best stove technology is uncertain.

A recent workshop hosted by International Cryosphere Climate Initiative in Amsterdam for European stove producers highlighted the threats that existing stove technology and testing regimes face, as European nations take more aggressive stances against wood stoves without turning to pellet technology as a solution.  

In Europe, there is a new push for a pan-European eco label that would recognize the cleanest and most advanced units.  Progressive members of the European industry association, CEFACD, are pushing for this label to counter public perceptions that stoves are simply too dirty for the modern world.  Currently, the required EU labelling scheme only looks at efficiency, similar to the Energy Star program in the US.  But efficiency is not as important as cleanliness in the field.  The Alliance for Green Heat has tried to reform the federal tax credit to consider both PM and efficiency, but we are only making progress on the efficiency front.  After years of campaigning, the efficiency listings on the EPA stove list may finally be used, ending a decade of widespread industry misinformation.

Eco labels are not a silver bullet, and weak ones can even be a form of greenwashing.  Several European labels have struggled to only recognize the top of the market instead of the broad majority of units, a problem that the US Energy Star label has also faced.  To keep eco labels effective and relevant, their eligibility criteria needs to be updated as technology improves.

Eco labels can also help advance pellet stove technology which has proved to be relatively clean in the field.  Few nations have capitalized on advanced pellet stove and boiler technology to tackle the fossil fuel domination of the heating sector.  In the meantime, the electrification of heating is advancing quickly though heat pumps.  

Efficient cold climate heat pumps are an excellent technology and can be paired with pellet units.  In other cases, pellet technology is still preferable.  Austria has made great strides in pellet boilers, and regional R&D and incentives are helping the nation accept the technology.  But the only country in the world to embrace advanced pellet stove technology is, surprisingly, Italy.  In the US, New England states provide incentives for expensive pellet boilers, but have largely ignored pellet stoves, which still have huge potential. 

Industry wants sales but the periodic surge of wood stoves sales can backfire.  In the UK, the government foolishly gave incentives for basic, manually operated wood stoves, which helped fuel a rapid rise in wood smoke that is now causing a legitimate backlash.  In Denmark, a surge of sales occurred when the Baltics became part of the European Union, allowing cheap imported cord wood to make wood heating more affordable than renewable district heating.  In the US, the surge happened from 2000 – 2008, leading to an increased use of burn bans and a push for a stricter NSPS.  And local events like the Montreal ice storm of 1998, ended up motivating the city of Montreal to take one of the most radical steps of banning the use of existing stoves, including many certified stoves that emit more than 2.7 grams an hour.   Now many European cities are looking at Montreal style solutions.  All of these examples could have been avoided, or at least mitigated, if federal, state, and local agencies created a better foundation for pellet heating.  

The slow sales of pellet stoves and boilers would benefit from a recognizable eco label that identified the top performers.  However, when wood and pellet equipment producers are represented by the same industry association, the producers of wood stoves and boilers that just meet the minimum standards can be a powerful force in opposing eco-labels.  And this leads us back to where we are today, without sufficient recognition and incentives for the very best wood and pellet technology. 

A lack of leadership and interest from the EPA, DOE, and wood stove industry has prevented Energy Star from developing a program for wood and pellet stoves.  And, Energy Star is founded on the goal of reducing fossil fuel usage, so reducing the use of wood and pellets doesn’t easily fit.  If a new eco label emerges in Europe, it could be adopted and used in the US and Canada if it had the backing of enough stakeholders. Or, European brands could simply start using a European label and try to gain recognition among North American consumers.

Wood and pellet stoves sales in the US are declining, and this decline is likely to continue with winters gradually warming, fossil fuel prices staying relatively low, and greater awareness of the health impacts of wood smoke.  If the status quo isn’t working, maybe it’s time to try something different.  Think eco label.